Maple Syrup and Magic
by Artemis Sparks
Summary: 3 Canadian Teenagers go forth to a new country from their small town homes. A story of laugh's and magic. Rated T to be safe.
1. Chapter 1

It was a fairly normal day back at the Pier. Frank handed Charlotte a beer, tossing it to her in an aggressive, yet loving, fashion.

"Here's yer beer, Charlotte."

"Dangit, Frank, couldn't get off yer ass to hand it tuh me like a real gent, couldja?"

"Dangit, Charlotte!"

They watched as their adolescent son sauntered past with a duffel bag in hand.

"Ma, Pa, the day has arrived! I set off to that fancy school today, remember? Pa, you were gonna drive me to the airport, right?"

"DANGIT, JOHNNY! You know I have arthritis!"

Johnny sighed.

"Fine, I suppose I'll have to ask Victoria's parents for a lift then"

"Jo-boy, take care of yourself, okay hun?" his mother said, her voice trembling with concern and intoxication.

Johnny took out his cell phone and called Victoria. Now He wasn't quite sure how, but Victoria was related to him. She was spawned from someone on his mother's side and it's only because of a luck of genetics' that she was one of the most sane member's of his family, Though Johnny thought that was only because Victoria was more like her Mom's side of the family, and really most of the members of Aunt Laine's family actually went to some sort of post-secondary educational system.

Out of all his family who lived within a reasonable distance away Victoria was the only one who had a parent with some sort of valid license to drive anything other than farm machinery, some sort of water craft, or a Zamboni. So left with Victoria as his only option Johnny pulled out his phone and made the call.

"Hi. You've reached Bernie's House of Bean Bags, how can I assist you?" a female voice answered in a monotone manner.

"Victoria?" Johnny asked, wondering why she would answer in such a manner.

"Johnny? Oh! I though you were one of them telemarketers. I thought if I pretended to be selling something, they'd leave me alone after a while"

Johnny chuckled. "Well, your mom can still pick me up, right? And Julia will meet us at that train platform."

"Yeah, Mom's firing up the GM van right now. It's been having some problems lately. We'll be there in a bit"

* * *

><p>As Johnny plopped down on the front steps to wait, the reality of the whole thing hit him. He sighed at the thought of leaving his remote east coast village in Canada, by way of Newfoundland. Especially the thought of leaving his parents all alone ...<p>

"DANGIT CHARLOTTE!"

"Frank! I thought I told you to buy some Molson!"

"BUT THIS IS SALE BEER! And it's made in Labrador! What part of that don't you get? DANGIT!"

Johnny suddenly felt a wave of relief wash over him at the thought of leaving his parents. He wouldn't have to control arguments about who was cooking the moose meat or who was going to get rid of the beaver dam in the backyard. He would leave that up to his little sister, Marie Antoinette. His parents had decided to give her a French name. Too bad they weren't very original. Poor little Marie ...

Chortling to himself, he slung his duffle bag over his shoulder maliciously. With a last cackle aimed at Marie, he ran out to the mailbox where Victoria's GM van was waiting for him, the door half hanging off the hinges. He didn't know how the Mounties hadn't spotted it driving around the province, but he thought it was only a matter of time before they caught wind of this death trap roving the side streets. He groaned as he stepped in some cow plop. Marie had a nasty habit of leading their only cow, Alexander Keith, ( Don't ask, it goes without saying that Frank and Charlotte named the cow) around their driveway.

As Victoria waved goodbye to his house, greeting him as he entered the car, Johnny barely making it before Victoria's Mom slammed down on the accelerator, making the van travel at 2 km/h.

"Well, you excited?" Johnny asked Victoria.

He looked at her. When one looks at Victoria, you don't notice things at first. She looks a bit like everyone else. Short reddish brown hair, short stature, pale complexion - which in Canada, really isn't that uncommon - a curvaceous hourglass figure (probably from all that moose meat and Timbits). Not to say she wasn't unattractive, but once you took a good look, there was just something there that drew you in. Johnny thought it had to be her eyes, sure they were just brown but when you looked into them it felt as if she knew the answers to all your questions. Like she was a library just waiting to give you the knowledge you needed to find. Not that Johnny ever asked her anything because God only knows what would have come out of her mouth.

She giggled. "Is a bear excited for the first thing it does after hibernation?"

"Well ... it does take a large crap..."

"WHICH IS A RELIEF FOR THE BEAR! So it's excited. Okay?"

Johnny shrugged, as he and Victoria laughed all the way to the airport.

Now, Johnny had a bit of a problem. The last time he was on a plane, it was the last time he had visited his distant cousin, Julia, out in Nunavut (which is a territory, not a province). Well, let's just say that they don't have the same restrictions as the rest of Canada. Let's just say ... Julia and a lightweight airplane didn't give Johnny the best view of flying. His parent were still paying the therapy bill's.


	2. Chapter 2

Chapter Two

It was not hard to spot Sally at the train station. She was, as usual, wearing her large headdress with maple syrup on one side and ketchup on the other. She also wielded several disposable cameras and a large fancy camera (borrowed from some friend of hers from London. ONTARIO. Not England). The bright red plaid flannel also directed attention like a traffic light. Her large fluffy moccasins just made her feet seem disproportionably large. Her long dark hair that extended slightly past her shoulder blades was very silky. Unusual. Seeing that it would normally be frizzy from excited running around and jumping for joy. Her large bordering on coke bottle glasses were perched on the bridge of her nose, causing red marks from the tremendous weight (no, seriously), and she had to constantly push up the frames. She had a very ... unusual appearance. It tended to scare her peers, or amuse them - depending on the people.

She was slightly taller than Victoria, and because she lived in a remote place with only 17 Tim Horton's establishments within Zamboni driving distance, didn't get to eat so many timbits, but what really made her stand out was the enormous Canadian flag that she had draped around her body like a toga. As soon as Victoria laid eyes on her, she squealed with glee and jumped in slow motion towards her. Sally did the same. Johnny was slightly confused. He hadn't seen Sally in almost 2 years. Last time he had seen her, she was a scary thing with braces. "Um ... hey there Sally" he said, timidly.

"HI! OMG I TOOK ALL THESE PICTURES AND IT WAS REALLY COOL BECAUSE I WENT TO THE PALACE AND I TOOK A PICTURE WITH THE GUARDS AND OMG I GOT MY ZAMBONI LICENSE AND I CAN, LIKE, TOTALLY DRIVE A ZAMBONI NOW AND HOLY SHIT IT'S BEEN FOREVER SINCE I'VE LAST SEEN YOU OMG VICTORIA! HOW'VE YOU BEEN OMG JOHNNY!"

Johnny wondered why they never spoke much, but this answered his question. However eccentric Sally may be, she was still (distantly) related to him, so he had to love her. She was probably from his dad's side, anyway. Explained everything. You see, Johnny's dad was one of 23 children, half of which were adopted Chinese children from ... China. It just so happened that a nice woman from Toronto married one of those Chinese siblings ... and through some weird tale of romance, which ended in murder and beavertail creation ... Sally was the result. She obviously took after her dad's side significantly.

"Um.. I've been ok… I guess." Johnny replied afraid that he would say something that would set her off again, because one memory that Johnny had retained from the last time he had seen his cousin was that once you got her going even a wild pack of polar bears couldn't stop her.

" Sally, are you ready? Are you ready for what is sure to be the greatest adventure we've ever had?" Victoria said with mock seriousness, and a determined expression on her face.

"Yeah I've got the… special surprise in my bag. Do you have yours?"

" Most assuredly, this is going to rock."

Johnny had a horrible sense of foreboding creep up his spine, all that flashed through his mind was that last time these two were together with a special surprise and well to say the least, Victoria's brother was never the same after that. Johnny really didn't want to end up like that so there was only one thing to do. Find out what their plan was before they could execute it and get them all kicked out of school, because there was no way he was going back home.

"We should go to the platform, I think that the train is going to be here soon." Johnny turn and started off towards the platform, hoping that Victoria and Sally were right behind him, if the loud whispers following behind him were any tip off, they were. He heaved a sigh this was going to be a long trip.

As they weaved their way through the throng of people, fighting the apposing flow of people towards the platform entrance Johnny heard the opening bars to the Canadian national anthem resound through the station. He looked to Sally who was humming along, and then to Victoria who was digging through her rather large backpack. She pulled out a cell phone proudly play the song.

" hello" Victoria said

Victoria walked away talking on the phone, and Johnny knew that he should be suspicious but all the could focus on was that she left him alone with Sally. Now this could go one of two way's; one her followed Victoria and pretended not to realize that she want to talk alone or two Sally would do to him whatever she did to Chris (Victoria's brother) , and that for sure wasn't going to go well. So Johnny did what any small town Canadian boy would do.

He went up to the nearest conductor and informed him that the two weird girls over by platform 9 were going to cause some sort of trouble and that her should go and deal with it. No you may think it cold to turn in one's own family but all that was going through Johnny's mind at the time was that it was better them then him.

Johnny watched as Victoria and Sally's bags were searched.


End file.
